


Appearances

by Rosie_Rues



Category: Diana Wynne Jones - Chronicles of Chrestomanci
Genre: Gen, Yuletide, challenge:Yuletide 2008, recipient:Annakovsky
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-25
Updated: 2008-12-25
Packaged: 2017-10-13 17:44:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 545
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/139973
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rosie_Rues/pseuds/Rosie_Rues





	Appearances

That evening, after they'd finally seen the last of Gwendolyn, Julia very reluctantly made her way along the corridor. Outside Gwendolyn's room, she set her shoulders and then knocked hard on the door.

Janet opened it. When she saw Julia, her expression tightened. She looked so like Gwendolyn that Julia found herself hating her without meaning to. Then she reminded herself that this was how she'd got into this mess in the first place.

"Can I come in?" she asked.

"If you want," Janet said. "It's a bit of a mess, though."

Janet wanted to say something friendly like _You should see my room,_ but couldn't quite manage it. Instead she stepped through the door silently. Then before she could stop herself, she said, "Wow!"

There were clothes everywhere, and all the furniture had been shoved into the middle of the room. Even the gilt dressing table chair was wobbling on top of the bed.

"I think I got a little carried away," Janet said, sounding rather sheepish, which was not something Julia had ever heard from Gwendolyn. "The whole room was so awfully girly that once I started moving things around I just couldn't stop."

"It is terribly frilly," Julia said critically, turning round to study it. If she wasn't looking at Janet, she could believe she was a perfectly nice and ordinary person. "Why don't you ask if you can move into a different one?"

"Oh," Janet said, sounding rather startled. "Do you think I could? This one does rather reek of Dear Gwendolyn."

"Let's just move all the furniture back," Julia suggested. "Then you can move out tomorrow."

Janet, when scarlet and sweaty from hauling the other end of a wardrobe, didn't look anything like as much like Gwendolyn as she had ten minutes ago. When they finally got it back into the right place, she leant against it with a loud, "Ooph. That was even heavier that time. Thanks ever so much, by the way."

"No problem," Julia said, and then cleared her throat. "Actually, I came to say sorry again. For some of the things I did when I thought you were Gwendolyn."

"Don't worry about it," Janet said. "They were quite funny, some of them, and I would have done much worse to her if I had the chance. I wish I could do magic."

"It doesn't seem fair that you can't," Julia said. "If you're her double, you should have her powers too."

"I don't think it works like that," Janet said and then turned very serious. "I think an awful lot of her power was actually Cat's, though."

Julia shuddered. "I wish I'd _noticed._ "

Janet snorted. "She had everyone fooled, from what I understand. Except your father, of course."

"Nothing gets past Daddy," Julia agreed with a sigh. "Except for people's names. He even called me Judith once." Then she made up her mind. "Look, once we've got all this sorted out, the boys are playing mirrors down the passageway. D'you want to join in?"

Janet gave her a pleased, startled look, followed by a beaming smile. "Yes, please."

It was funny, Julia reflected, as they turned to tidying up with a vim, how, when you thought about it, Janet really didn't look like Gwendolyn _at all_.


End file.
